The President
by Summoner Luna
Summary: His new place is small, and his life has been so big. [Laguna. Memories. What was and wasn't and is.] [for The Successor 2016]


"Well? What do you think?"

Laguna isn't sure how to answer, and scratches his head as he looks around the room. "It's uh—"

"Small." Kiros laughs and walks across the room to the floor-to-ceiling windows that look past the edge of the city. "But you still have a hell of a view."

"Yeah," Laguna nods.

A view. That's why he chose it, right? He dimly remembers coming to see the place, Ellone and Rinoa opening closet doors and exclaiming together over the ins and outs of the condo looking over the lake, of talking over dinner one night about his post-Presidential options and choosing here as his new home. Did he decide? Or did he let them? He's sure he had a say in the matter, but right now it's hard to be certain.

"…you okay man?" Kiros has walked away from the window and is standing beside him now, and places a hand on Laguna's shoulder. He shakes his head and looks at his friend, and draws his face into a smile.

"I'm good, I'm good. Just a big change is all."

"Tell me about it." Kiros walks over to the brand new refrigerator, empty except for a six pack of beer and a few bottles of water. He grabs a beer for himself and tosses Laguna one of the waters, and holds up his bottle. "Cheers, Mr. President."

"Former," Laguna smiles, and holds up his drink. Now he walks to the windows and leans against them, his forehead resting on an arm stretched over his head. The sun cuts a golden path across the lake, and in the distance he can see the ghosts of the mountains. The city is behind him, and from where he stands you would never know how big it is. And even if you could, you would never know how much it's grown since he first set eyes on it twenty years ago.

"You sure this is the right place?" Kiros joins him at the window and Laguna glances sideways.

"Nah," he says, as honest as he ever is. "But after where we've been anywhere's gonna feel weird, right?"

"That's not what I meant, and you know it."

Laguna looks back to the lake. His reflection is barely visible in the glass in the afternoon light, and he crinkles his nose at himself. "I'm not sure about that, either."

The condo is small and cramped, after the Palace, and it will take some getting used to.

.

"Well, what do you think?"

Raine is standing just to the side of him, hands on her hips and wearing a look on her face he has come to recognize.

"There's uh…" he gestures to the wall on the side of the stairs, and she draws her lips into a thin line.

"This town is war-torn, Mr. Loire. I know you've been laid up, but the war's gone on without you. There's bloodstains soaked into the wood under the rug as well, but if you want to check, don't do it front of Elle."

"This is where—"

Raine nods, and Laguna feels his stomach do a summersault.

"I can't live here," he starts to say, but Raine holds up her hands.

"You can live here, or you can leave town," she says. "I own this place. Or at least, I do right now. And I'll patch them up eventually, but Winhill's a forgotten enough place during peacetime, and right now the upper continent has all trade frozen so I can't get any building materials. It's…"

"It's perfect," Laguna says quickly, and grins at her. It's not perfect, not really. He'll have to get used to the bullet holes, and he knows the second she walks away he'll end up lifting the rug to see if the rest of her story is true, but he's not about to leave. Where would he even go? Back to the Army? He's probably been declared dead by now anyway, and (he thinks with the slightest hint of shame) he may as well take advantage of that.

The mild impatience fades out of Raine's look, replaced fully with kindness, and she stretches out her hand. "In that case, I'm pleased to officially be your landlord."

Laguna clasps his hand around hers, and widens his smile. "I'm pleased to be your subject. Er, resident. No—tenant!"

He looks at her nervously, and when she starts to laugh he does as well. Their hands stay clasped just a little longer than professionally necessary, and after she finally pulls hers back and hands him a key, Laguna steps out under the awning, and watches her until she disappears through the front door of the bar.

.

"Oh my goodness Mr. Laguna this place is _amazing!_ "

Selphie breezes into the room, a rush of color and excitement, followed by Irvine and Zell who both take their time and sweep their eyes around the space.

"Not bad, sir," Zell says, and Laguna smiles, reminding him for the thousandth time since they've met that he doesn't need to call him 'sir.'

"Thanks," Laguna says, and walks to the refrigerator and passes a few soda cans around the room.

"Quistis sends her regards," Irvine says, and pops the tab on his can with a grace Laguna has never managed once in his life.

"Everything okay?" Laguna asks.

"Life of a SeeD." Irvine shrugs, and joins Selphie at the window. Beige curtains hang from dark brown metal rods. They don't look quite like the display at the store and he's sure he forgot to buy something the salesperson recommended, but if Squall's friends notice, they don't say anything. And it's nice to invite people over and have a few furnishings to make the place feel like home.

Irvine lets out a whistle and says something about the view, and Zell points out a few things Laguna could do to improve the lighting. The lakeview condos are fairly new, and more than high-end, but everything Laguna has learned about Zell has left him prepared for the list of DIY projects he's bound to leave behind.

 _What he would be, if he weren't a SeeD_ , Laguna thinks, and not for the first time.

Zell is going on about wanting to help build a deck off the back of the unit, while Selphie eyes the walls, blank except for a framed painting of Winhill. They love the new place. They say it, collectively and individually, at least six more times before they leave, and when Laguna closes the door behind them he frowns at the silence. He is feeling more energized than he has in days and wants anything but to be home alone, and takes a look around the space and grabs his keys, and closes the door behind him.

.

"Uncle Laguna! Uncle Laguna!"

Ellone is bouncing up and down on the front stoop when Laguna opens the door, and he sweeps her into his arms and dips her down, planting kisses all over her head. Ellone shrieks with laughter, and pushes her small hands into his cheeks, shouting, "No! No tickling!"

Laguna twirls her around twice and sets her down in the kitchen, watching her anxiously.

She runs around the room, and if she remembers anything at all, she doesn't show it. She's far more interested in the bright green hand towel hanging from the stove ("This like Raine's!") and testing the full range of motion of the swivel chair he managed to salvage from the dumpster behind the hotel ("Wheee! Swing with me, Uncle Laguna!").

"Does Raine know you're over here?" he asks, and Ellone stretches her legs out on the chair and grins at him.

"No," she says, and giggles at the squeak in one of the hinges.

"Well before we swing together, let's go ask if it's okay, okay?"

Ellone shows no sign of moving, and Laguna tiptoes over to her, his hands stretched out like imaginary claws.

"If we don't get going, you just might meet… The Tickle Monster!"

She lets out another peal of laughter and folds in on herself when he brings his hands to her sides, and instead of tickling her, Laguna lifts her up and holds her over his head.

"Up!" she shouts, and Laguna tosses her towards the ceiling and catches her, once, twice, and on the third time he pulls her against his chest, and Ellone wraps her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist, and drops her head onto his shoulder. He is always amazed at the ability small children have to mold themselves against the adults they love and trust, and Laguna supports her with one arm and runs his other hand across her back a few times, before giving her another kiss on her head, and lowering her to the kitchen floor.

"Let's tell Raine where you are now, so she doesn't worry, alright?"

Ellone responds by grinning and running upstairs. Laguna is faster than her but too cautious to try and pluck her from the steps in case he causes her to trip, and when she reaches the top she beelines for the small room at the back of the hall. _Her old nursery._

She is in the room before he can catch her, empty except for a set of beige curtains hanging from the window that Raine dug out of a closet in the pub, and when he enters, Ellone points at one of the corners. "That's my bear's corner," she says.

"Your…bear?" he asks, trying not to panic. _She remembers. Raine swore she was too young—_

"Where is your bear, Uncle Laguna?"

"It's uh…"

"Let's go see it!"

Ellone runs out of the room, but this time Laguna catches her at the door to his bedroom and sweeps her into his arms, and pretends to drop her when he gets to the top of the stairs. She laughs at this new game, and does not mention teddy bears again.

Raine is already halfway to the old house when they walk out the front door, and Laguna gives her an apologetic shrug. Ellone crashes against her and holds her leg, and Raine gives her a mild scolding for running off without saying anything. She meets Laguna's eyes and nods towards the bar, and Laguna, relieved that Raine will be there to run interference if Ellone mentions her bear again, closes his door behind him and walks over to meet them.

.

Rinoa Heartilly is living proof of the past repeating itself, and her presence in his living room is doing nothing to help with the sense of placelessness Laguna still can't entirely shake.

"Laguna—what's wrong?" he hears her asking. There is worry in her voice, mixed with a trace of impatience, and he turns from where he has been watching the reflection of fireworks over the lake and gives her an apologetic smile.

"I'm sorry—what?"

"Well now I know where Squall gets it," she says, her face relaxed once more into a smile.

"Nah," Laguna says, with an easiness he doesn't believe. "He's always lost in thought. I'm just lost."

They laugh, and he rises and goes into the kitchen to pour them each another cup of coffee. Rinoa starts to speak again, something about the event she and Squall were attending before he was whisked away to some urgent Garden matter, before she called the only person in the city she felt comfortable being alone with on Transparency Day.

"I'm going to ask you one more time—what's wrong?"

Laguna stumbles, and almost spills the mug of coffee all over her red dress. "I uh—"

"You've barely made eye contact all evening. I promise, Squall really did have something he had to—"

"You just look so much like your mother."

He's blurted out the words before he can stop himself, and this time he really does spill a little bit of her coffee. It splashes across her knees and she lets out a small cry and jumps back, and takes the mug out of his hand.

"Laguna…"

"I'm sorry Rinoa. Hey, I think it's the finale—" he points to the window, to the bursts of light exploding in the sky, and Rinoa reaches for his arm and pushes it down.

He finally looks at her, because if he knows anything about her it's that she won't back down, and a thousand jokes he could make run through his head, each worst than the last, but anything is better than staring at his son's girlfriend and seeing his _ex_ -girlfriend, and—

"Tell me about her," Rinoa says softly.

"…What?" He feels a pain starting to flare up in his leg and is grateful he is seated, and reaches for his own mug of coffee like it's a lifeline.

"I've never asked you. I know you didn't know her long, but you knew her…differently. She wasn't _Julia_ when you knew her. I've never been able to hear about her from from anyone who knew her before she was famous and I don't… I have so few memories. So if you're thinking about her anyway, why not talk about her?"

 _Because…it's been ages,_ he thinks. But, time doesn't care about love. He knows this better than anyone. And while he hadn't thought of Julia in years until Rinoa entered his life, he loved her, for a time. _And Squall loves Rinoa now._

"She was…just a little older than you are now when we met," Laguna begins. He pretends like he doesn't see the tears already forming in Rinoa's eyes, and by the time he is done with his story, both of their cheeks are wet.

"Thank you," she tells him. She sits her empty mug down on the coffee table and walks to the window and looks into the darkness. The moon is a thin band on the horizon, and on the far side of the lake, the lights from the Sorceress Memorial glow in the thick summer air. Laguna walks over to her and she leans her head into his shoulder, and his heart aches for her, and for Julia. There are too many children in his life who never had the parents they deserved, and they have suffered for it. Laguna is ashamed of his role in that, and is determined to do everything he can to make it right.

.

He no longer knocks when he enters the pub, and when he walks in today, Raine is leaning against the bar flipping through a magazine. She looks up when the chimes over the door ring out, and flips the magazine over on her fingers so he can see the front cover.

"You knew her, right?"

Laguna wipes the sweat off his forehead and pours himself a glass of water before looking at the magazine. Summer is in full effect, and he has been on the edge of town looking for a population of grendels he overheard a few of the pub patrons talking about the night before. When he finally sees who it is Raine is talking about he feels the color drain from his face and he freezes.

"Oh Laguna, look at your face!" Raine shakes her head and reaches up to brush a few strays hairs behind his ear, and Laguna reaches for the magazine. Julia Heartilly is staring back at him, a burst of rose petals layered in to the background behind her.

"That's Julia," he says, and grimaces at how stupid he sounds.

"The singer, right. But you asked Kiros about her while he was here. I'd forgotten about that until I got this in the mail this morning. So, tell me about her!"

"Not much to tell," he says, and it's not a lie. There _isn't_ much to tell, even if what there is was important, while it lasted. But it's over. He's thought of her, of course, but less and less, and telling Raine never seemed necessary. He buys time by getting another glass of water and drinking it as slowly as possible, and when he is done Raine has set the magazine aside and is staring at him with a shrewd look in her eye.

He should have seen the connections forming. He should have been surprised it had taken her this long to figure it out. He should have.

But Laguna has never stopped to think the way he should, and before he can open his mouth Raine lets out a gasp.

"Oh my—Laguna was she— _you were the missing soldier!*_

"I—"

"You _were!*_

"Guilty as charged," he says with a shrug, and Raine shakes her head.

"I can't believe I didn't make that connection before. The timing is perfect, though—but Laguna, you never… You never mentioned her?"

"Like I said," he says, and thinks through each word as much as possible. _Come on Laguna. Try and keep your foot out of your mouth for once._ "Not a whole lot to tell."

"But she owes her whole _career_ to a song she wrote about you. There has to be _something_ to tell…"

She trails off, and Laguna tries not to let himself believe there is a faint trace of jealousy in her voice. Raine is his friend. She took him in, gave him health and housing, and they might spend most of every day together, but…

 _So why, Laguna, have you been so hesitant to talk to her about Julia?_

"She was…a lounge singer," he finally says. "Me, Kiros, an' Ward used to spend a lot of time at the place she would sing. I always liked her, and finally the guys talked me into talking to her one night. So we uh… Well, I went to her room one night, and uh… Well…"

"…You know what, on second thought, I have to—"

"—Yeah, I should get back to—"

"Right," they say simultaneously, and in their haste to leave the conversation, they end up walking right into each other. He steps back with a nervous laugh, and Raine stands in front of him biting her lip. They stand like that for nearly a minute, before someone opens the door to the bar and the breeze that blows in knocks the magazine to the floor. It opens to an advertisement for a clothing store in Deling City, and he looks from where it lays, back to Raine, and nods to the customer approaching the bar.

"It was short lived," he says. "We had a lot in common at the time, and it was nice to talk to someone who…who was meant for better things than we currently had. I mean—I don't mean that you aren't meant for better things. I mean—who had dreams. Not that you don't have dreams. I just—"

"Laguna, stop." Raine's eyes are sparkling, and she bends down to pick the magazine off the floor and hands it to him. "I've got everything I need right here in Winhill. But Laguna…do you?"

She brushes past him to take the customer's drink order, and Laguna steps to the side and watches her. Her movements are not as easy as they normally are, and her smile looks forced, and if he didn't known any better he would swear she is about to cry.

.

Squall and Ellone are early, and Laguna is running behind, as usual. He looks up from the stove when he hears the door open, and grins from behind a veil of steam.

"I wanted to have dinner ready as soon as you got here, but well, you know me." He raises a hand in greeting, momentarily grateful he isn't faced with the decision of whether to hug, or shake hands, or simply wave when Squall follows Ellone into the room.

"Oh, come on," Ellone says playfully. She hands Squall her coat and joins Laguna in the kitchen, opening the lid on one of the pots on the stove and grabbing a spoon like she came to the condo for no reason other than to help finish dinner. After hanging their coats, Squall steps towards the kitchen and watches the two of them. Laguna still feels nervous under the intensity of his son's stare, and in his nervousness he fumbles, and sauce splashes out of the pan and onto his thumb.

"Ouch," he mutters, and feels heat in his cheeks, and tries not to let himself believe he sees a small smile forming in the corner of Squall's lips.

"Squall can't judge," Ellone says, and takes the spoon from Laguna's hands, nudging him out of the way. "He can barely boil water."

Laguna can't help himself and he looks to Squall, who just shrugs. "Rinoa makes sure I eat when I'm not at Garden." He sets a bag down on the breakfast bar that Laguna did not notice him holding, and pulls out two bottles of wine and a loaf of bread, and extends his hand towards Laguna's knife block. "I am handy with a blade, though."

Laguna stares at him for a second and then lets out a laugh that bounces around the entire room. It's too loud, embarrassingly loud, but Squall, his stoic, impossible-to-read son has just made a joke, and a funny one at that. Ellone (thank goodness for Ellone) laughs with him, and Squall only raises an eyebrow and accepts the handle of a bread knife his sister passes over, and Laguna is laughing so hard he's almost crying.

" _What?"_ Squall's look seems to say, and for a moment, Laguna sees Raine in him so strongly he feels like he's been pulled backwards in time, and his laugh changes. Now he really might cry, and he wipes at his eyes and busies himself with pulling plates and flatware onto the counter. If either of his children notice his change in demeanor (and of course they must), they don't say anything.

In minutes, Ellone has finished cooking, and is spooning heaps of homemade sauce over spaghetti noodles, while Squall opens one of the bottles of wine.

"What?" he says again, when he catches Laguna staring at him.

"Nothing," Laguna says quickly. He takes two of the finished plates and moves them to the small dining room table, Ellone close behind him. He can never find his footing with Squall, and everything he says always seems to be wrong.

"Laguna's not much of a drinker," Ellone says behind him, holding three wine glasses anyway.

"I know," Squall responds. Laguna is sure the two of them have already had this conversation, but he appreciates the show they are putting on. Squall pours two of the glasses and holds the bottle over the third, looking at Laguna once again through his mother's eyes.

"Er—"

"Go ahead. We'll drink his if he decides he doesn't want it."

Squall nods at Ellone, and the three of them sit down. Squall and Laguna are facing each other, and Ellone looks between them and laughs. "Well," she says, and holds her glass up to the center of the table. "To family!"

Squall's expression doesn't change, and Laguna reaches for the wine glass, then changes his mind and grabs his water instead. "To family," he echoes, and takes a drink. He doesn't look at the fourth chair at the table.

The sauce has turned out perfect, and the conversation is smoother than he expects. Ellone asks questions about his day-to-day life, now that he isn't busy being President, and Squall mostly listens, and when he does talk most of what he says is about Rinoa. Laguna chances looks at the empty fourth seat when he can, and tries to ignore the duel feelings of pride and sorrow battling it out in his heart.

It's Squall, who mentions it first.

"Was someone else supposed to be here tonight?"

Ellone looks puzzled, but Laguna is focused on Squall, and for a moment they lock eyes.

Raine's eyes.

 _How am I ever supposed to find a way to feel comfortable around him?_

He could lie. He's a writer, and a politician. A thousand ways to redirect the conversation fly into his head, and are chased out by a pressing need for honesty. That's what Squall needs. It's what he deserves.

So Laguna reaches, not for his water, but for the glass of wine, but instead of drinking it he gestures towards the empty space at the table.

"Your uh… Your mother."

He sees Ellone's hand freeze halfway to her fork from the corner of his eye, but he is still staring at Squall. There is no reaction, at least, not one that he is able to discern. Maybe Ellone can. Maybe Rinoa could. But not Laguna. The clumsy soldier. The absent father. The man who has no idea how to have this conversation.

"My…"

He stares at the wine for a moment, and in it, he hears Raine's voice in his head. _Just talk, you idiot._

 _(That's what I do. I speak from the heart.)_

"I wish she were here right now. Sitting around a real table in a real home, it's just a lot more obvious that we're missing someone."

Squall and Ellone are both silent now, and Laguna shakes his head.

"I haven't seen her in over twenty years, but you look _just_ like her. And she should…she should be here. She should be here to teach you how to cook and to meet your girlfriend, and see the two of you together." He looks to the empty chair, and allows himself the rare indulgence of imaging what things would be like, if Raine were still alive. Would she have made dinner tonight? Or would he? An extra twenty years with her, and instead of instant meals reheated at midnight while he watched the city falling asleep, maybe he would have finally learned how to cook, and wouldn't still need Kiros to talk him through simple recipes to try and prove to his children, to his son, that he's not as incompetent as he appears.

 _He knows that._ Raine's voice is back. _If you have anything in common with him, it's accidental positions of leadership. Squall knows that doesn't come from nowhere._

"It was…easier to pretend she was still okay, and that one day I would go back to Winhill and she would still be there, when I was living at the palace. Nothing there felt like home, so it was easier not to dwell on the pieces of home that were missing. Here I'm by myself, and sitting here now it just keeps hitting me that this is what it might have been like."

 _If it weren't for my mistakes,_ he wants to say. But Ellone has scolded him enough for blaming himself, and he has already had this conversation with Squall, and no amount of honesty will take away the guilt. He should have known. That's the only truth he has.

The room is dead silent except for the ticking of a clock. Laguna is still holding his previously untouched glass of wine. Ellone has moved her hands into her lap and her face has shifted into something neutral, and Squall is as hard to read as ever.

Then, he shifts his eyes to the empty space. He looks at Laguna, at Ellone. He looks at Laguna's left hand and then at his own, and back to the empty chair. And then he picks up his glass and raises it again.

"To mom," Squall says. His voice is flat, but it's a different kind of flatness than Laguna has heard before. It will occur to him later that this is the first of many times to come he will be able to detect nuance in his son's voice, but right now he only cares about the words, the gesture.

"To mom." Ellone's word are choked, and Laguna looks between the two of them, glasses held high, and finally raises his own, and blinks back tears.

"To Raine," he says.

He brings the glass to his lips. He has not tasted wine since the night before he left Winhill. It's drier than he remembers, but he takes a second drink, and looks at his family. They do not smile, not at first, but they go back to their conversation, and the fourth place at the table does not feel quite as vacant as it did before.

.

Laguna stands in the doorway of the pub and watches the last of the night's patrons stumbling across the town square, fighting a heaviness in his gut. The late autumn air is crisp and cold, and carries a sense of foreboding.

"Everything okay?"

Raine's voice drifts down from the top of the stairs, and Laguna pulls the door shut and slides the lock into place, hitting the switch at the bottom of the steps and covering the pub in darkness. He walks upstairs into the increasing brightness of a few gaslit lamps, where Raine is waiting for him.

"Laguna?"

"All good," he says, and grins at her. "Just watching the last ones leave. Thought one of them might trip on the cobblestones. That's easy enough to do when you haven't had as many as them, and I should know. They took so long to leave tonight, I thought I was going to have to actually drag them out. Of all the nights for people to hang around it had to be tonight, and…I'm rambling, aren't I?"

"You? Ramble?"

Raine gives him a smile that doesn't fully reach her eyes, and walks from the top of the stairs around to the small couch. She has already changed into her nightclothes, and Laguna watches her, running his thumb across his wedding band, still too new to be entirely familiar. She leans towards the table and Laguna registers that she has a bottle of wine and two glasses waiting, and he scratches his head.

"Hey—that's the bottle you've been saving for—"

"For when the war is over," she says, and he walks towards the couch and sits beside her. He starts to reach for her hands, and she continues, "But I want to share this with you, and—"

"—I'm coming home, Raine. I'm going to find her, and we're both coming back here."

"I believe you, Laguna," she says, in a way that very clearly says she doesn't, a way that Laguna promptly ignores. "But let's just say the war ends before you get back. I've held onto this too long to drink it alone."

This he allows, and they let her implication hang in the air. Raine uncorks the bottle, and Laguna watches her fill the two glasses. The loft is pleasantly warm compared to the constant chill from downstairs, and Laguna looks around the room, to Raine, and back, feeling, for the first time since he got the idea to leave and bring Ellone home, doubt.

 _Elle needs you,_ he thinks. Her toy box still sits in the back corner, and her tiny jacket still hangs on the coat rack. It will be too small for her this season, but they haven't been able to pack it away, just in case she came home before they could buy a new one.

Raine _needs you,_ another part of him thinks. He imagines a different version of himself sitting on each of his shoulders, only without the wings and pitchforks. _You got her to fall in love with you and now you're just going to walk out on her?_

 _It's not that._ He knows it, and she knows it, and he has never felt more torn in two than he does in this moment.

He feels Raine's hand on his cheek and startles. He did not even hear her set the bottle down, but she has turned towards him, and lifts his glass out of his hands and rests it beside hers on the table.

"Stop," she says.

He stares at her. Her eyes are dark shadows, set into skin that glows in the lamplight. "I could stay," he says.

"You would never forgive yourself."

"I might."

Her lips part in a sad smile, and she shakes her head, and when she blinks the light catches tears on her eyelashes. Laguna reaches up and wipes one away with his thumb.

"I'm coming home," he says again, as much for his own benefit as hers.

"I know you mean to. But I just have this horrible feeling that this is…this is the last night I'm going to see you. I can't tell you why."

"You're just worried about how quiet it's going to be without me," he says, and wishes he hadn't. When he thinks of leaving, he thinks of finding Ellone. He doesn't think of Raine coming upstairs alone each night. The morning after Elle was taken the quiet that filled the loft was suffocating, and he has been uncomfortable with it ever since. But he has not stopped to think about how much quieter it will be when it is just Raine, alone, and now that he has, the knots return to his stomach even stronger than before.

"I might get so used to the quiet you won't be welcome back," she says, and he wants to believe it.

"Not to mention our customers might get what they ordered for a change." He smiles, and she laughs lightly.

 _Our_ customers.

She brushes imaginary dirt from the fabric covering her knee, and Laguna frowns, unsure of what he should say.

 _Say you'll stay,_ one of the voices says from his shoulder. The light reflects in her eyes when she looks back up at him, and under the thin laughter at his bad joke, she is sad. Laguna is not used to seeing her sad, and the thought briefly crosses his mind that there is probably a lot he's not used to seeing. Which is of course, the point of what he's about to say.

"You know, I have a secret I never told you."

"You? Keep a secret?"

"Hey now, I kept my proposal a secret for like, a week, before you wore it out me!"

"That was no secret, Laguna, and you know it."

They share a smile, and Laguna runs his thumb over his wedding band again. He wonders when the novelty of being able to do that will ever wear off. _If_ it will ever wear off. He hopes it doesn't.

"Okay, you got me," he says. "But I do have _a_ secret. When Kiros first came here looking for me, we uh…may have accidentally eavesdropped on you talking to Elle."

"Accidentally?"

"You betcha. But she asked you…well, about me, and you told her that you thought I wouldn't be happy in a town like this."

Raine's smile fades, and Laguna quickly reaches for her hand. "You weren't supposed—"

"—to hear that. That's why I said we were eavesdropping. But Raine…" He tightens his grip on her hand. "I just want you to know…that's not what this is. That's not why I'm leaving. If Elle were here…" His voice catches. Images flash before him, of Ellone squealing and running through the loft, of lounging on the couch with Raine after a long shift when he was too tired to walk next door, while Ellone slept peacefully between them. Of them becoming a family in all the times they weren't expecting it. "I love Winhill. And I love you. And I promise, that would be enough."

She looks back at him and he sees the thoughts running across her face, thoughts he knows she'll never say out loud, and they both know she doesn't have to.

"I know," she finally whispers. She leans towards him, and he kisses her, slowly, as if it's the last time he's going to get the chance, and pulls her close. He runs his hands over her, trying to absorb the memory, trying to promise her that this won't be the last time. She leans back onto the couch and pulls him down with her, and he feels in every movement the fear they both have that this might be the last time.

After, they pour the rest of the bottle of wine into their glasses and bring them into bed.

Laguna stares into the corner at Ellone's toys, Raine laying against him. "Elle needs a playmate," he says, when the quiet of the room is finally too much to bear. "Don't you think she'd be a good sister?"

Raine draws herself closer against him. "I've thought about that before."

"You have?"

"Not all of us say things the second the pop into our heads," she says, and he chuckles. "But it's…hard to think about that, with her being gone. I didn't want to talk about it."

"Do you want to talk about it now?"

"No," Raine says. "I want to enjoy the moment. But…when you come home… Yes. She needs a brother or sister. She's had so much loss, had so many horrible things happen to her. We can give her something to be happy about."

Laguna nods, and threads his fingers through hers.

He wants to ask, _but what if she doesn't come back?_ But it's too hard, too horrible to imagine.

He wants to say, _we'll do it anyway._

Instead, he holds the remains of his wine up with his left hand and tilts it towards her.

"To Elle," he says. "And to our family."

Raine taps her glass against his. "To family."

They empty their glasses, and fall asleep in each other's arms. A few hours later, Laguna kisses her goodbye on the platform of the train station.

He never sees her again.

.

The morning dawns clear, and Laguna stands at the edge of Winhill, looking at the pinks and oranges of sunrise, and draws in a long breath and slowly lets it out.

He has been here three times, since he left Raine in search of Ellone. Once, after the fall of Adel, when he was told only that she had died, that Ellone was gone. When he had doors slammed in his face, and could only accept that he had failed. That he had left his wife, and Ellone still ended up without a home in the end.

The second time, was after the second war.

And the third, was when he decided he couldn't come back. That it was too hard to look at the life he could have had.

Now he approaches the grave slowly, and lays a single white rose against the granite before sitting down beside it.

"I know I said last time I wasn't coming back, and I managed for awhile, but I guess you're not surprised that I changed my mind."

The pinks in the sky are fading, and the sun is spreading out across the plains.

"I'm not the president anymore. Haven't been for a few months now. It was time, and I'm relieved. I told you before, I never even did that much, or at least it never felt like I did. But I still felt like I should. I still worry about the place—I spent too long in Esthar not to feel like it's home, but now at least I don't have to know about every little thing that happens. I'm still living there, though. Elle and Rinoa—you remember me telling you about her, I'm sure—they helped me look for a place, and found a condo overlooking the lake. You can see the lights from the Sorceress Memorial at night but we never looked at it at night before I bought it, or I never _would_ have bought it, but they're actually really pretty, if I can forget what they're for.

"Since I moved I've been thinking…what if you were right, all those years ago? Maybe I wouldn't have been happy in a small town like this. It's hard enough being happy in Esthar, now that I'm just an average Joe. But now that I'm standing—well, sitting here… Raine, I promise I would have been happy. I spent twenty years hiding in a crystal palace because I thought if I was the best I could be, it would make up for what I lost to get there. And now that's gone, and what I lost is all I have.

"I made Squall laugh though. I've told you before that you would love him—not just because you're his mama, but he's just so much like you. He's gotten more comfortable talking to people since I first met him. I don't know if that's Rinoa's influence, or just that he's getting older, but the more those hard edges wear off the more of you I see in him. I think all the parts of you that weren't done living just moved right into him, because I feel like you're right there with us when he's in the room sometimes. And we're…we're a family, Raine. Not the way we were supposed to be, but I really think we're going to be a family. And now that I'm back here, I just keep thinking about the family we could have—should have been. Twenty years in the crystal city didn't fill the void, but the short time I spent with you did. Just imagine if we'd had a lifetime."

Laguna blinks back tears. He wants to continue, wants to tell her more, tell her everything, but his throat is too thick, and the words won't form.

Instead, he sits, and lets the sun rise over them.

"It won't be so long this time," he says, when he finally gets up to leave. "I may even move back here one day. But I stayed in Esthar for so long out of shame. I want to try staying there out of choice for awhile."

The walk back to the train station is long, and Laguna looks over the town while he walks.

This is his past. This small town he was in for barely a year, where he left his heart when he went to find his soul. And Esthar has been his present.

He thinks of his condo. Of the steady stream of visitors: his friends, Squall's friends. Of Squall and Ellone, and how no time at all seems to have passed in the years they were apart.

Of his family.

And of his future.

* * *

 _I have so many feelings about Laguna and the Loire family overall it's not even funny, guys. This didn't turn out quite as I thought it would-my original inspiration was actually the song "The President" by Snow Patrol, since I'd kind of wanted to do so something Laguna-related based on that song anyway, so as soon as emeraldlatias posted the challenge theme for this year my immediate thought was a fic about Laguna transitioning into life after being president. But then it turned into a Laguna/Raine feels!fest instead, and as strings085 and I have discussed before, there is entirely too little fic about Laguna and Raine. I kind of wish some elements of it were longer-each section seemed to be longer than the one before it, and I don't feel like I really developed Raine enough, but I think expanding the beginning parts would take some of the effect out of the end, so in the numerous times I read through this for editing I decided to leave them as they are._

 _I know a lot of people have lots of strong headcanons about Laguna and this probably doesn't fit entirely into those-I really just can't match the silliness he's often associated with-but hopefully this is a good blend of how ridiculous he often is and how he is, regardless of his absent-mindedness and impulsiveness he is a man who was a soldier, and a journalist, and the president of a hugely innovative country for almost two decades, and is a lot more than just a bumbling caricature who makes dad jokes. (Although he does make a lot of dad jokes.)_

 _(**Transparency Day = the day the Esthar shields came down. I hope that's obvious, but I agonized over what they might call the anniversary of that and finally settled on this name, so if that wasn't obvious, here's the explanation.**)_


End file.
